Game 4 of World Series postponed by rain
ST. LOUIS - Pitchers dominated the first three games of the World Series and the rain took over.
Game 4 was postponed Wednesday night because of rain and will be made up Thursday at 8:27 p.m. EDT, potentially sending the World Series into scheduling chaos. More showers are expected the next two days, and nobody was certain when the Detroit Tigers and St. Louis Cardinals would play again.
"They're going to be dicey," said Jimmie Lee Solomon, executive vice president of baseball operations in the commissioner's office.
Game 5 at Busch Stadium was pushed back to Friday night, which was supposed to be a day off in the Series. It doesn't look much better this weekend in Detroit, with a forecast of rain and cold.
The Cardinals lead the best-of-seven Series 2-1 after a 5-0 victory behind ace Chris Carpenter on Tuesday night. A silver tarp covered the infield all evening, players didn't come out to warm up and Game 4 never got started.
"You want to go out there and play, but you can't control the weather. It's not that big of a deal," St. Louis outfielder Preston Wilson said.
Steady showers all day led to the first World Series rainout since the 1996 opener between the Atlanta Braves and New York Yankees. The rain fell harder as the night progressed, and the game was called after a delay of 1 hour, 51 minutes, the first time a Series game in St. Louis has been rained out.
It also was the fourth washout of a wet postseason. The Cardinals had two games rained out in the NL championship series against the New York Mets, and Game 2 of Detroit's first-round series at Yankee Stadium also was postponed.
The postponement gives St. Louis manager Tony La Russa a chance to juggle his rotation if he wants. He could bring Jeff Weaver back on regular rest in Game 5 instead of pitching rookie Anthony Reyes again. Reyes, however, tossed eight-plus strong innings for a 7-2 victory in the opener.
Tigers manager Jim Leyland could do the same with Kenny Rogers, who beat Weaver in Game 2 on Sunday night and extended his shutout streak to 23 innings this postseason. But Leyland specifically set up his rotation to give Rogers two starts at home, and the Series doesn't shift back to Detroit until Game 6.
A sparse crowd at Busch Stadium was informed of the rainout about three minutes after Major League Baseball made the announcement. Fans covered in plastic who had hoped for the rain to stop quickly filed toward the exits.
'Scrubs' Returns as NBC Remakes Thursdays
LOS ANGELES -- Old is the new new at NBC.
Starting Nov. 30, the network will bring back the Thursday comedy block that was an NBC staple for some 20 years before this season. "Scrubs" will come off the bench to start its sixth season that night, and "30 Rock" will move over from Wednesdays to join "My Name Is Earl" and "The Office."
NBC will also air super-sized episodes of "Earl," "The Office" and "30 Rock" on Nov. 16 before launching the full new lineup at the end of the month (the Thursday in between is Thanksgiving). The change spells the end for the Thursday edition of "Deal or No Deal," and "Twenty Good Years," which had been paired with "30 Rock" on Wednesdays, appears to be done as well.
"We are excited about the prospect of two-hours of top-notch comedy on Thursday nights, which includes the return of 'Scrubs,'" NBC Entertainment president Kevin Reilly says. "We will stay on-brand with the best comedy block on television, which will position us for the future on the night."
The four comedies will try to keep NBC in the game on a night dominated by CBS and the newly potent ABC. "Scrubs" and "30 Rock" will have the most daunting task, airing in the 9 p.m. ET hour opposite the top two shows on TV so far this season, ABC's "Grey's Anatomy" and CBS' "CSI."
The move of "30 Rock" to Thursday will also force a change to NBC's Wednesday schedule. The network plans to feature specials in the 8 p.m. hour starting Nov. 22. Neither "30 Rock" (6.9 million viewers) nor "Twenty Good Years" (6.07 million) has fared too well so far, but critics have generally been kinder to the former show, which was created by and stars "Saturday Night Live" alum Tina Fey, and it's a better fit with the other single-camera comedies in the new block.
No Joke: 'Borat' Is Make Unglorious Slash
Apparently coming to the conclusion that middle-America will not "get" Borat (official title: Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan), 20th Century Fox has cut in half the number of theaters that had been booked to show it, the studio confirmed Tuesday.
Fox distribution chief Bruce Snyder told today's (Wednesday) Los Angeles Times that despite enormous pre-release publicity and marketing, the studio's research had concluded that the movie was "soft in awareness."
The Times noted that industry analysts could not recall a similar action by a studio taking place just two weeks before a film's opening.
Fox indicated that it hopes that by opening Borat in 800 theaters, the resulting word of mouth will propel it into a stronger position the following week when it will be expanded to 2,200 screens.